


Noise Cancellation

by sameuspegasus



Series: Glowy Green Slime [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Michelle Jones Is a Good Bro, POV Outsider, Protective Michelle Jones, Sensory Overload, Sick Peter Parker, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, emergency contact, teacher pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 14:51:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19443682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sameuspegasus/pseuds/sameuspegasus
Summary: Peter's senses go haywire at school. Time to call his emergency contact.Feat. Sensory overload, MJ cares, Tony Stark is Peter Parker's emergency contact.





	Noise Cancellation

Monica stands with her back to the wall beside the open doors of the school gymnasium, monitoring the students as they file in for assembly. There have been growing bullying problems recently, mostly verbal and online, although there have been one or two incidents of physical violence. Principal Morita’s solution to the problem is to gather the entire school in the gym and have a group of college students perform anti-bullying songs to them. Monica has doubts about it working, but, hey, you never know what’ll take.

She confiscates a remote control car from a freshman and two phones from seniors before she spies Peter Parker and Michelle Jones come in and park themselves as close to the back of the crowd as possible. Ned Leeds if off sick today, so it’s just the two of them. Monica’s class had been strangely quiet without Ned’s constant excited whispering to Peter. Michelle is holding a book, her thumb marking her place as she looks around her. Peter sits next to her, huddled in a too-big hoodie with the hood up to partially obscure his face. He’s wearing sunglasses and Monica can see the wires of his headphones snaking out of hood. If it were anyone else, she’d suspect them of being hungover, but Peter seems to have neither the time nor the inclination for that sort of thing. Plus, while Monica doesn’t know the ins and outs of Peter’s condition, she doubts he can get drunk, let alone hungover.

She makes her way over to them. “Put the book away, Michelle,” she warns sternly, “This is an important assembly, you need to listen. Peter, hood down, sunglasses off, earbuds out. Now.”

Peter twitches slightly at her voice, but he removes his hood and sunglasses, blinking rapidly and squinting at her. 

“Earphones too, Peter,” she tells him. Peter’s not the type to bully anyone, but the message of the assembly is a good thing for anyone to hear. Besides, she can’t enforce a rule selectively. It’s not fair.

“It’s not turned on,” he says.

“You still need to take them out,” she tells him, holding out her hands for his headphones. “Set an example for the younger kids.”

Slowly, he reaches up to pull the headphones out. “It’s really loud in here,” he comments as he hands them over.

Monica thinks nothing of it until she reaches her spot by the door again and turns to look out over the crowd of students. Peter is hunched in a ball, hood up, hands over his ears. Monica looks down at the item in her hands and realises what she’s holding is not a cheap, tinny set of headphones, but ergonomically designed earplugs with advanced noise-cancelling technology, made to mimic the appearance of ordinary headphones. She’s about to go back and return them when Principal Morita takes the stage. Out of the corner of her eye, Monica sees Michelle slip her own headphones into Peter’s hand. Too late, Monica remembers Peter listening in to Tony Stark’s conversation on the other side of the Stark Industries building, hearing every word perfectly. She vaguely remembers Tony Stark mentioning something about senses, but it had got lost in everything else from that day and she’d forgotten about it. The super-hearing had seemed at the time to be something Peter could turn on and off, but she’s realising now that it might not be, and that’s kind of horrifying.

The noise of a thousand students talking and moving around dies down slowly, but Principal Morita’s microphone screeches loudly as he removes it from the stand. Monica sees Peter clamp his hands over his ears. Michelle leans in to him, her normally impassive face concerned.

The anti-bullying band starts their presentation with a shrieking microphone and a furious drum solo. Halfway through the first song, Monica decides she has to step in. Peter’s curled up, head buried in his arms. Michelle, by her standards, is looking positively frantic, although no-one around them seems to have noticed her worry as she gently pulls at Peter’s arm, trying to get him to stand up. Monica, making as little fuss as possible, clears a path through the students surrounding them. She crouches to speak to Peter, her worry growing as she takes in his trembling form and short, sharp breaths. He lifts his head, flinching away from her touch on his shoulder. His face is ghostly pale, a faint sheen of sweat covering his skin. He takes his noise-cancelling earbuds from her, just lucid enough to put them in himself. They seem to help just enough that he allows Monica and Michelle to guide him to his feet and through the space between the students, out into the corridor.

Peter’s disorientated, spinning in a panicked circle in the corridor, stumbling slightly. He’s got his sunglasses back on, but his eyes are squeezed tightly shut beneath them. His hands are still shaking. Michelle takes his arm in hers and leads him towards the nurse’s office. “I can hear your heartbeat, MJ,” Peter mumbles. 

“You’re going to be fine,” Michelle tells him firmly.

Monica follows silently behind them. She’s not sure if Michelle knows. They might need someone who does.

The nurse wants to call an ambulance, but Peter’s with it enough to vehemently oppose the idea. They compromise on Peter lying in the sick bay with the lights out and the door closed while the nurse calls his emergency contact.

May Parker is unavailable. She’s assisting with an emergency surgery to repair a stab wound and won’t be out for at least four hours. The nurse pauses for a moment, frowning, before dialling the second number on the list. When someone picks up the phone, she says hesitatingly, “Hello, is this- is this Tony Stark?”

Monica isn’t required to stay, now that Peter’s in the care of the nurse, but she does anyway. The anti-bullying assembly won’t be over for another 45 minutes. No one will need her until then. Michelle stays too, settling herself in the chair outside Peter’s room like a guard dog and opening her book.

Tony Stark bursts through the door less than ten minutes later, entirely failing to maintain his usual appearance of selfish arrogance. “Where’s Peter?” he demands.

The nurse looks petrified. She’s only young, fresh out of training. So far, the worst thing she’s had to deal with is a nasty stomach bug and a few twisted ankles.

She’s saved from answering by the sickroom door opening. “I’m fine, Mr Stark, you didn’t have to come all this way.”

“Yeah, you look totally fine, kid,” Tony Stark says sarcastically, giving him a once-over. Peter is supporting himself on the doorframe, squinting in the dim light. His face is ashen, hair stuck to his forehead with sweat. He flinches involuntarily at the noise of Mr Stark speaking.

“It’s just a headache,” Peter lies, every bit the teenage boy who doesn’t want a grown-up to think he’s weak.

He looks tiny, standing in the sickbay doorway in a hoodie three sizes too big. He’s shorter than Michelle, and slightly built. Rationally, Monica knows he’s all muscle, agile and wiry with superhuman strength, but he looks fragile and delicate and even younger than usual, his eyes standing out huge against his pallid face.

“Sure it is, Pete,” Tony Stark says, his voice holding none of its usual impatience. “Go back and lie down, Happy will be here with the car soon.”

For the first time, Monica notices a small, metal briefcase in his hand. It’s red and gold and definitely doesn’t house any paperwork.

The end 

**Author's Note:**

> A tiny snapshot I wanted to bust out before Far From Home makes me remember Tony's dead. I'm going to see it tomorrow. I have extremely high expectations. If it turns out to be another Crimes of Grindelwald I'm going to be devastated.
> 
> As usual, I know nothing about:  
> The US School System  
> School Nurses  
> How emergency contacts work  
> Sensory overload  
> Superpowers


End file.
